Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Maybe you're driving back from Grammy's house, up the coast. Maybe it's a day where you're soaking up the sun coming through the car window, like a tree. Or a pineapple. Which sounds random, but actually you're driving past plantation after plantation of prickly pineapple plants ... so it's not.

And you've got Pink blasting on the radio, because your 3 1/2 year old loves her music. And actually - you do, too. Besides, there's nothing like listening to your baby girl belt out her version of decidedly mature lyrics from the backseat.

Raise your glass, if you like cookies.

One hand rests on hubby's knee, bridging gearshift and parking brake. The other hand? Free to move cookies from tin ... to ... mouth ...

The process
1. Preheat the oven to 160C (325F) and line a baking sheet with baking paper.

2. In a large bowl, mix together all the dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, mix together the wet ingredients. Then add the wet stuff to the dry stuff and mix thoroughly.

3. Drop 1 Tbs amounts of cookie dough on the sheet, about 5cm (2") apart. Smoosh down the tops with a fork. Bake about 20-25 minutes in the preheated oven, until they're golden and you're able to move them without them sliding apart. [see update below]

4. Transfer your cookies to a rack to cool, then store them in an airtight container for up to a week.

The cost
Less than $6 per organic batch. Leaving you with change for coffee. If you feel like leaving the comfy confines of your sunbathed capsule ...

UPDATE - JUNE 2013
I haven't made these in awhile, and felt the need to revisit them. I made a couple of changes, which I think improved them. #1 - I forgot the water. That was accidental, but it really wasn't needed. Maybe it was just different flour, or levels of humidity ... whatever it was, the lack of water didn't matter a bit. So use your best judgement - see how dry the dough looks before adding it.

Another thing I did this time was use rapadura sugar. To my taste, rapadura is sweeter and imparts a beautiful caramel flavour during cooking. To compensate for the sweetness, I recommend reducing the sugar in the recipe to closer to 1/2 cup. Actually, now that I think of it, maybe that's why I didn't need the water ...

Who knows. Or cares. These cookies taste amazing.

Last change - I promise. Instead of dropping tablespoons of cookies onto the sheet, I rolled them into balls in my hands, smooshing them so they held together quite nicely. (If they don't, you might need to add that water). Then I fork-flattened them on the cookie sheet before baking them.

Then, I pulled them out of the oven and ate 2 straight off the tray. I might even be having one now ...
Amanda xx

Thanks Amanda for the blog of the week link! I love that idea since there are so many great blogs out there to come across. Have a great weekend-- you are inspiring me to make some healthy cookies... waiting for this baby to come & think I need to bake ;)

I've never heard of anzac biscuits before - but they look like my kind of cookie :] Not too sweet...coconutty and whole-grainy :] is there something i could use in place of the golden syrup? i'm not too familiar with how sweet that is, as I've never had it before. Not sure if maple or honey would be too sweet or thin - brown rice syrup, perhaps?

Hey Jess! Anzacs are an Australian traditional cookie ... though this is a bit of a non-traditional take on them. I'd give brown rice syrup a try ... the recipe doesn't call for that much of it, so I reckon it'll be fine. Let me know how it goes!xx